And yet

satisfied with a far inferior degree of assurance. such, in ten thousands of instances, is the evidence by which we know the honesty of those from whom comes our testimony to the great facts of the gospel history. They did suffer the loss of all things; they did endure to be treated as the offscouring of all things; they did give themselves to the rack, and flame, and wild beasts, for the testimony of Jesus.

I mentioned, in the announcement of this lecture, that besides a summary of the whole previous course, it would contain an application of the argument to the principal objections brought forward by infidels. This, in substance, has been exhibited. We know of no objection of any im portance which is not put to silence and buried, by an appeal from what men think to what men have done ; from speculation to testimony; from the ideas of objectors to the facts of witnesses. The simple application of the great principle of inductive philosophy, that whatever is collected by observation ought to be received, any hypothesis to the contrary notwithstanding, is the smooth white stone in the sling of David, which no champion of the Philistines, however gigantic in intellect, or learning, or in the boast of either, can stand. I am now speaking of the chief objections. I have nothing to do with the ignorant ribaldry of such an antagonist as Paine. To this man, the purity of the gospel was its chief deformity; and its stern contradiction of his disgusting vices, its most irreconcilable inconsistency. He studied the Bible to defame it, and scraped the common sewers of infidelity for its very lowest and filthiest objections; and then, without honesty even to advert to the thousand answers each had received in its day, served them up with his own dressing of strong assertion and acrid ridicule, and advertised them to the world as his own, and as unanswerable. Such matters we must leave to the writings of those who have had stomach to handle them. In the answer of Bishop Watson, you may see how entirely boasting is their strength. They need but the light, to make all their show of argument

fade away. Their best answer is found in the profligate life and despairing death of the poor, miserable man himself.

The mysteriousness of certain things in christianity is urged as a strong reason for the rejection of its divine authority. Many will not believe the doctrine of the Trinity; the divinity of Christ; his incarnation; his atoning sacrifice; his resurrection from the dead; his intercession in heaven; the influences of the Holy Spirit upon the hearts of men, and our new creation unto holiness by his converting power, not to speak of many other of the deep things of God, because they are mysteries. Mysteries they are unquestionably, and were intended to be so regarded. So far as we have need to understand them, they are as intelligible as the plain truth that man is the union of body and spirit. So far as we are not concerned to understand them, they are as mysterious, but not more so, than the nature of the union between body and spirit in man. Religion must have mysteries. "Religion without its mysteries is a temple without its God."

Whither shall we flee to get beyond the region of things incomprehensible? They beset us behind and before. If from revealed religion, we go to natural, they are there! The most essential doctrine of all religion, the existence of God, is mystery to the uttermost. What explanation can be given of his self-existence? His presence in all parts of the universe at once? How he inhabits eternity, having no relation to time--and immensity, having no relation to space? If from natural religion, we go to atheism, they are there also! He who denies the existence of God, plunges at once into the most confounding of all mysteries. What in scripture is more incomprehensible than that this world had no Maker? that all its examples of wise and deep design had no Designer? Will you go from thence, to the experimental certainties of natural philosophy? Mysteries are there also! Explain the attraction of gravitation, the nature of electricity, the elastic power of steam, the secrets of evaporation. What is vegetable, or animal, or spiritual life? In mechan

ics, we arrive at the utmost certainty respecting the relations of force, matter, time, motion, space; while, with the things themselves, we have not the least acquaintance. They are mysteries, as unsearchable to us, as the deepest things of revealed religion. How force is communicated from one body to another, is no more intelligible than how the influences of the Holy Spirit are communicated to man. Matter, in its changes, is as incomprehensible as grace in its operations. "There are questions, doubts, perplexities, disputes, diversities of opinions, about the one as well as about the other. Ought we not, therefore, by a parity of reasoning, to conclude that there may be several true and highly useful propositions about the latter as well as about the former? Nay, I will venture to go farther, and affirm (says a devoted teacher of science) that the preponderance of the argument is in favour of the propositions of the theologian. For while force, time, motion, &c., are avowedly constituent parts of a demonstrable science, and ought, therefore, to be presented in a full blaze of light, the obscure parts proposed in the scrip tures for our assent are avowedly mysterious. They are not exhibited to be perfectly understood, but to be believed. They cannot be understood without ceasing to be what they are. Obscurities, however, are felt as incumbrances to any system of philosophy; while mysteries are ornaments of the christian system, and tests of the humility and faith of its votaries. So that if the rejectors of incomprehensibilities acted consistently with their own principles, they would rather throw aside all philosophical theories in which obscurities are found and exist as defects, than the system of revealed religion, in which they enter as essential parts of that 'mystery of godliness' in which the apostles gloried."*

If from natural philosophy, we ascend to the higher branches of pure mathematics, the regions of unmixed light and certainty, where naught is tolerated but strict demonstra

* Gregory's Letters.

tion, even there will mystery find us, and its right hand will hold us.

Explain the demonstrated fact that "there are curves which approach continually to some fixed right line, with out the possibility of ever meeting it ;" that "a space infinite in one sense, may, by its rotation, generate a solid of finite capacity;" that "a variable space shall be continually augmenting, and yet never become equal to a certain finite quantity."

These are depths which the mathematician can solve no better than Christians can explain the great mysteries of redemption. But they do not hinder him. He can use, as the elements of his calculation, doctrines thus incomprehensible, without feeling any diminution in the certainty of the result. Why may not a Christian, with equal reason, include among the articles of his belief doctrines no more incomprehensible, without embarrassing his assurance of the duties and consolations which result from them?

If mysteries be valid objections to that which speaks of God and his relations to man, why are they not at least as formidable in all those branches of human knowledge in which created and finite subjects alone are involved? But they are not treated as objections by the mathematician or the philosopher. The former asks no question, but simply, what is demonstrated? The latter, what is proved, either by experiment or by testimony? If phenomena be well attested, he does not wait to understand their cause, or mode, or effects; he does not suspend belief till he has harmonized their peculiarities with a favourite hypothesis, or with previous observations. He sets them down among the truths of science, and believes; taking for granted, that though he may not understand them, there is One that does; and though he should never discover the theory by which such events are shown to be in agreement with all others, there is still a harmony which pervades "all things in heaven and earth, and under the earth."

Such is the application of inductive philosophy to the mysteries of nature. Let the mysteries of revelation be treated with equal justice; and instead of employing them as objections to its truth, you will acknowledge them as essential to its nature, and portions of its glory.*

But there are many who object to christianity, not only because they cannot understand the nature, but because they cannot see the reason, of certain things contained in, or connected with it. For example: It is well known that God is gracious and merciful, and desireth not the death of a sinner, and that He has all power to save whom He will; and yet it is revealed that without the sacrifice of Christ, and without conversion and faith, the sinner cannot be saved. Why, it is asked, this circuitous method, this expense of suffering, when a word from the Almighty would save the world? An intelligent Christian could give many answers to this question; but what if he had none? Would the way of salvation, as revealed in the gospel, be in any degree less credible? Shall we refuse to believe the ways of God, till he has laid all his reasons before us? Why not as well deny His works on the same indefensible ground? Why believe that a sick man cannot recover without a tedious course of medicine? God can raise him with a word! Why cultivate the ground, and seek the mediatorial office of the sun for the raising and ripening of your grain? God can load your fields with harvests without such a circuitous process! Why His power is not exerted immediately for these purposes, you can no more explain than why a sinner cannot be saved but by faith in the sacrifice of Christ. Your belief in the importance of intermediate steps depends as little upon the reasons of the divine appointments, in one

case as in the other.

Again: you read that the gospel is of inestimable importance to the happiness of man; a wonderful exhibition of

*See an admirable article on Mysteries in Religion, in Gregory's Let. ters, vol. i.